July 11

I have some of the best friends and family… seriously! And again, they surprise us! This time with Holly (my sister in law of course) up and planning a mini birthday party for our Echo (August 13). Since we are not going to be local for her actual day she decided this was one birthday that she, James and Jimmie we NOT going to miss out on! 

Just for Echo!

The boys’ comfy bed

The showing off of the fish

Add to the fun Jimmie’s Gammie (Holly’s mom) up from Texas and some presents for all of us and it was AMAZING. But first there was hellos. catching up, hugs, cuddles and play time.

Gammie braiding hair

Then a walk to 7-11 for their special free 7.11 oz slurpee day – JULY 11, 7 11… Of course I had to get a bigger one but still… slurpees for ALL!

Free slurpees?

Of course we want those!

Gotta hold hands on the walk back

Yum!

And THEN it was time for the party fun. CUPCAKES… made by aunty, with purple icing and a candle and singing and everything. Of course we stripped the birthday girl down to her skivvies and she had to have her own cupcake. It was so much fun!!! Thank you Holly SO MUCH! It meant the world to have a birthday party for our baby with you as well!

Happy EARLY birthday Echo!

We received some lovely gifts from our family, and I even got some wonderful hugs from my not so baby brother. 

I got a hug too!

It was hard to say good bye to them once again. We HAD TO get a group shot of course.

Hugs

Cousins

And just like that our family was reunited! What a crowd we are!!! It is just too bad that it was ROASTING out and we couldn’t really go and play in the park with Jimmie. BUT we could stop at Victoria’s on the way home to have dinner with her, Karyn and Lauralee! With the kitties too!

Hello Kitty

We love you

Supper!

And after supper… well the splash park of course! Where else does the Reinsch-Johnson family go to beat the heat??? And with friends it is ALWAYS better…

Splish

Splash

Spray

Fun!

The girls

Though there was a shoe break…

Shoes!

Drying off

And then another good bye before the drive back to Sharon’s and the knowledge that there was still almost half a week to go before the weekend and MORE activity… SERIOUSLY!!

And Magnus the kitty as well!

July 6-9

Friday marked the beginning of TWO adventures… We coordinated with Karyn AND Esther to work everything out relatively smoothly. We drove from the Bleau’s in the morning stopping off at Karyn’s work to collect her keys and say hello… oh and drop off two owls for Lauralee and Victoria! From there it was time to drop off the female portion of our little family at Karyn’s apartment in time to terrorize the cat and tidy the rooms. 

With Esther running behind schedule (as per usual) even with a quick stop off at Dollarama for a few necessities (ie. toothpaste for Trinity) we had enough time to get the dishes mostly done and carpet vacuumed before she appeared for a quick snuggle and visit. 

SNUGGLES

 That marked the beginning of the boys’ adventure – Aunty Esther collected them at Kristen and Fydo’s where Ken was finishing up with our sort  through and helping with some furniture movement into their now almost completely finished basement and they were off to the city for THEIR holiday from US!! 

In the meantime the girls and I sat back and enjoyed the quiet that is Karyn’s apartment and waited on Karyn finishing work. Now how to spend the evening? Well with girly things including doing HAIR…

Note the pro action with Echo

And blowing bubbles.

Bubbles

And apparently eating cereal with unicorns!!!!

Snack time with Unicorns

The next day it was time to enjoy our day to the fullest. I had received something rather special in the mail thanks to Karyn… a birthday card from my Dad and StepMom with spending cash. Karyn’s bank was open so we were able to change it over to Canadian and it was  time to head to the mall and get to the serious business of shopping!! But before that a special homemade breakfast by Karyn – raspberry pancakes, fresh bacon from the Farmer’s Market and Pepsi… cuz we rock that way!

Pre breakfast sunshine

Note the sheep inclusion

Breaky

Let’s see… we started at the MACS counter where I purchased a brand new foundation with some extra sponges. 

Dressed to impress

Then there was the Body Shop (of which there are TWO in Minnesota… I checked! One in Mall of America and the other at the airport??) with its clearance items and a lovely 3.00 lip colour. We wandered some more just to see what there was to see and then headed over to Winners where Trinity got a special shirt – Hello Kitty of course – for being such a well behaved girl. 

You can see the shirt here

I waffled over a maxi dress that after checking out Old Navy with no success I returned to purchase along with a new pair of sunglasses (finally, that morning my old ones just sort of popped apart after years of use and abuse!)… 

Shoe break

Don’t forget lunch! A mall lunch of anything we felt like… Trinity had frozen yogurt and I got myself some Umi Sushi Express. Don’t forget our traditional poutine which was Karyn’s meal of choice. 

Lunch at the food court

We were SUPPOSED to have dinner with the guys as Ted and Sean came up to help Ken search through his Magic cards for the ones he plans on selling (seriously we downsized EVERYTHING). BUT they got all jumbled in their meal choices so we gave up on waiting and ordered in another favourite! Indian Flame Indian Food!!!!! SOOOO good!

Supper

After some more time on the balcony enjoying the sunny day the girls went to bed and we settled down for another special treat – Blue Eyes tea and cherries. Remember Blue Eyes from the Library High tea? Well I was able to pick some up from the source for the event and bring it to share with Karyn. And it was worth it! Combine the lovely tea and fresh fruit with HEDGEHOG time and silly movies – Spice Girls AND the Beatles movie… and our day was… AWESOME! 

Tea

Kitty

And hedgehogs oh my

Sunday morning was a little more stressful with a tired and hot baby and a cranky little girl. The weather has held out at warm for so long everyone just feels sticky. So we sent the girls along to Ken that afternoon and took a couple hours of together time which included finishing laundry AND going to DQ for food and ice cream. 

Ted and Trinity’s new sweater

Sean and Kristen

We ended up at Kristen and Fydo’s for some more visiting… Sean and Ted had already left but got to play with the girls some… and then it was time to say good bye, head back to Karyn’s for the stuff we left there and head back to town. WITHOUT the boys! As, until Sunday evening they were at Esther’s and then that evening gone over to see their cousin Jimmie. So not only did we see MORE people, do MORE things but we did it with TWO kids!! CRAZY!!!!!

Just the girls, note Trinity is ASLEEP!

And that was my weekend… WOW! 

Oh and a special thanks to Kristen who snapped this one one night this weekend!!

JUNE 24th/25th!!

As of June 24th yours truly is 33 years old! And loving it! Now how did I celebrate it… Well back in town with Karyn and all… lunch with dear friends! My very first Dim Sum! We originally planned for Indian food but our favourite restaurant does not do Sunday lunch. Echo was totally on board, Trinity not so much. We were very firmly told that she wanted Fruit Loops and yogurt. In fact, we started our day with Fruit Loops!

NOMS

I felt so special with the friends who turned out for lunch… Lauralee, Victoria and Kristen rounded out our gathering. It wasn’t too busy at  the restaurant and we didn’t have to wait long once we made our selection. It all tasted delicious and was a brand new thing for me. 

Pre Dim Sum gaming

And more

Birthday girl!

So good!

Echo approved!

How better to finish off our celebration than to head over to Kristen and Fydo’s for handmade cake courtesy of Victoria!!! Total yum with some amazing visiting and squiggle time for Echo and Trinity. We do miss visiting with these lovely people so the chance to sit and relax with them was AMAZING. I felt so spoiled! It was great to give the girls time to reconnect with some very special Aunties AND see Uncle Fydo, of course! Thank you so much ladies!

My cake

Happy Birthday to ME!

Cutting the cake

After saying good bye to everyone we had a quick stop off at Karyn’s to collect our over night items and then head back to Grandma’s. Of course we had to stop off for a slurpee first before leaving town. The drive went pretty well, but it always does when we travel with Karyn. Back to the reality of a 5 child family… though I am not quite sure I really was missed! Apparently life can be more fun without Mommy and her rules and school books. BUT I got hugs! 

My present from Kristen and Fydo! THANKS!

Life was a little topsy turvy with the kids running wild and a new dog visiting (Whoopsie and only on a temporary basis). And of course there was the inevitable boy mess in the basement making us settling in near impossible and instant mean mommy appear. So a bit of a let down BUT home we went. Monday was a difficult day… the boys were NOT ready for back to school stuff… and the girls were still settling in. 

Balance

Ken did set up work so that we could all FINALLY go see the Viking ship. AND get pictures taken with the kids IN IT! Very cool… check out the lake and the swans… and generally photograph the family and the stuff around us. That always is a pick me up for me! I do love my camera! 

Gavin and Zander

Emanuel

Miss T

And Baby

With Daddy

The Centre

ME

Mini me?

In the afternoon we did have a visitor – one of the boys’ friends Kenneth who lives next door to mom’s old house came over to play and took the boys and Trinity down the road to the nearby park. He biked over and was more than willing to be in charge of the crew and take them out to play. 

Fun in the backyard

That was about all we had going for us on Monday… Except… my belated birthday ice cream cake thanks to Sharon!!! I felt soooo spoiled!!!!

CAKE

and... a LAKE